Birch Wood Bio-Char – 20L

Our Birch Wood Bio-Char is fast becoming well known to gardeners as an amazing way to turn waste plant material into a magical soil improver. It is a carbon-dominant input made from hard wood birch tree forest debris that is heated in a kiln with minimal oxygen levels, allowing the wood to be ‘charred’ but not burned in a process called pyrolysis. The end product is different from coal, charcoal or ash, in that it holds a honey-comb type structure, allowing micro pores to remain, which is what allows it to offer it’s benefits to the soil. We use birch from managed woodland waste because it makes the best final product due to its fine structure. It’s an ancient technology believed to be over 7000 years old, used by people in the Amazon basin in the form of Terra Preta soil.

Birch Wood Bio-Char will offer the following benefits:

1) Improve the structure of the soil by offering greater aeration as well as water holding
2) Lock in nutrients by binding with the carbon so they cannot be leached or flushed out
3) Increase the cation exchange (CE) functions in soil, boosting nutrient availability
4) Provide homes for many types of microbes & fungi, increasing diversity in rootzone
5) Helps to balance PH and keep it where plants prefer it
6) Adds much needed carbon into the soil which drives microbial development
7) Helps to make nutrients increasingly available, meaning less inputs are required
8) Some growers have reported an increase in seed germination of up to 40%
9) Some growers have reported a 15% increased yield when using Bio-Char in their soil mixes

The quality of Bio-Char differs greatly depending on the type of wood used and the way it is cooked in the kiln. There are many different levels of quality of Bio-Char, often poor quality products are made from soft woods or brash or not cooked properly. The best Bio-Char has as many tiny little holes as possible. This is what will allow it to hold air and water in good balance and provide homes for microbes. It is also made slowly at lower temperatures. The quality of Bio-Char is inversely related to weight, a good biochar particle is very light, full of porosity, with a lot of surface area. Low quality Bio-Char can have a high ash content.

We recommend Birch Wood Bio-Char be added at between 5-10% of soil volume and only benefits are seen. If adding to a dead soil, some sort of inoculation is possibly beneficial but when using with a quality living soil it is not necessary and reduces the ability of the native microbes to populate the Bio-Char. We do add a little moisture to minimise the dust created when opening the packaging so it is ready to use immediately when received.

Available in 5L & 20L Buckets and 50L Bulk Bags.